So sorry about the late posting of this blog. I was away on an anniversery vacation with my beautiful bride of 26 years. I didn't take my computer, so as not to be distracted. But I had dutifully written the blog last week and it was saved. Right after the show aired I went on the hotel computer - it was glitchy and the mouse was sticky and next thing I knew the text disappeared and the blog autosaved and I was scr#!ed!

Just got home and here's the post:

As I mentioned in a blog last year – we had a plan in Season 1 to show or imply
how the harnesses got onto our kids. We even built a set and were ready to shoot it.It was a scene in episode 5 of last
year – the one where Hal’s character enters the hospital with a harness on his
back to free Ben.There was a
scene planned where Hal would follow a trail of blood and come into a creepy
room filled with medical tables, straps and a creepy machine that looked like
it was going to stitch the harnesses onto the kids back.

Well, fate intervened and, although we scheduled it two
or three times – that scene never got shot.

Probably, as usually happens, what seems tragic at the time turns out to be all for the best - because this years YOUNG BLOODS episode
shows a much longer, much creepier sequence that far outdoes what we had
planned in Season 1.From the
writer’s room there were a couple central themes to explore in the
episode.The first was, what if
there were a bunch of feral kids who were living and surviving on their own,
without adult supervision and in fact not trusting adults.

The second idea was that Weaver’s daughter Jeane was discovered with the surviving
kids, was introduced it was more important to focus on her character than the
other kids.

I loved this storyline because it shows a deeper side of Weaver. His intensity and loyalty to the 2nd Mass is clear. But as a father he left much to be desired. He deeply regrets his failings with his family, but - and I love this about the writing of this episode - he still can't overcome his flaws. And even though he and his daughter, probably need each other more than anything in this crazy post-invasion world, he still pushes her away in the end. The tragedy of this, to me, feels real and profound.

When Will Patton learned that his daughter was entering
our story, he was very interested in who would play her.Will is a meticulous actor who not just
plans every aspect of his character, but also really lives it.He came to us and wanted to know if he
could come to the auditions.Of
course I was thrilled.It’s always
better if, in an audition, you can see the chemistry first-hand between
actors.We did the normal
preliminary auditions without Will.(I probably, typically, see 20 or 30 actors for each role.)Will came to the callback auditions
after we’d narrowed it down to four young ladies.All of them were very good and any one of them would
have been a legit contender for the role.But when Will Patton read with Laci Mailey, there was a certain magic and we
all knew it right away.She
is a great person and she fit in with our group right away!

Before I move on - I must tip my hat to our casting
directors: Coreen Mayrs and Heike Brandstatter. They are, without a doubt, the premiere casting directors in
Vancouver.I worked with them on
SMALLVILLE and they just have an incredible knack for discovering unknown you
actors who eventually become big stars.The best example of this is, I remember is between season 3 and 4 of
SMALLVILLE…We were on hiatus
between seasons but it was known that Lois Lane would be coming onto the show
the following season.I got a call
from Heike and she said, “We have a young woman we’d like you to meet.I think you should cast her for
Lois.”They sent me an audition
tape and the actress’s resume.She
was great – but, at that time, we didn’t have a scene or a script or really any
idea of how Lois was going to work on the show.I said, “We don’t have a script yet, but when I come back
next season we can read her.”Heike said, “She’ll be gone by then.She’s too special.”I was very dubious.“She’s
obviously great,” I said, but she’s unknown.She has NO credits.’Heike just reiterated, “She’ll be gone.”And that was that.Anyway, that actor was Evangeline Lilly And just as she said when we came back
for season 4, Evangeline had already been cast in the pilot of LOST and the
rest is history.But we suffered
no loss, because they went right out again and discovered an even better more
perfect Lois Lane Erica DuranceAnd the rest is history once again.But the story points out their skill.When I was on the show MELROSE PLACE, they
had discovered 3 of our 5 regular cast.But no one knows it.Coreen
and Heike are like the secret weapon farm team scouts of future Film and TV
stars!

Miguel Sapochnik was the director of the episode.I
had never worked with him before.Miguel is relatively new to episodic TV, but he had directed the very
eerie movie “REPO MEN” as well as the very creepy and disturbing “HOUSE”
episode entitled “AFTER HOURS.”I
already knew from the writers what the storyline would be, and I thought maybe
he’d be the right guy to oversee our creepy and disturbing harness factory
sequence.I called my old pal Greg Yataines, who had been using Miguel regularly on HOUSE.Greg gave Miguel the highest praise and
vouched for him most unequivocally.And since I trust Greg, and know he’s an even tougher taskmaster than I
am – after that we hired Miguel without hesitation.

It was a good choice. What impressed me most about Miguel is how he took command. Directing TV episodes is a weird job. You come in to the middle of an ongoing project, and are expected to take over a cast and crew who are already working together. To fit one's style, and temperament into this ongoing venture, not to mention to navigate the sometimes complex politics of a TV show - can be quite tricky. I find with many directors, who have only ever done TV, that they can be too acquiescent and passive. Well Miguel took authority and responsibility of this episode as being his right away. To me that was a great thing!

The harness factory, as you can probably imagine was an
ordeal to design, schedule and shoot.The writers had written a very long elaborate sequence, which involved
numerous skitters moving unharnessed kids through an abandoned factory,
attaching the kids to a creepy conveyer belt with travelled them into an open
pool filled with writhing skitters.The kids were dunked into the water where the harnesses literally fought
each other over them, and then they would swim onto their backs and attach to them.

There were three sequences, which were intercut;
one was the kids being harnessed.The other was Tom’s unit moving through the factory blasting skitters
and eventually freeing the kids.The other story involved Maggie’s group freeing the unharnessed kids and
guiding them away from a platoon of skitters and to freedom.I think in the original version, Maggie
and crew even attached C4 to the factory and blew it to hell once Tom and his gang were safe.

We went well down the road of prepping and designing
this.But it was just
off-the-charts expensive.The
episode was scheduling out at 10 or 11 days (as opposed to the 8-day shoot we
are budgeted for) and was hundreds of thousands of dollars over budget.

After a day or two we abandoned this and came up with a
simpler alternative.The kids were
going to just appear out of nowhere, sliding down a slide and into a huge cauldron filled with
swimming harnesses.From there, a
skitter would reach in and pull them out and lay them on a gurney.The army of skitters was reduced to
four.The Tom’s-group story and
the Maggie’s group story were still intact.

But as we went to budget the giant cauldron, which was going
to have to be manufactured, it was a huge cost and the budget was still
astronomical.

So we moved to plan “C” – which was what we have now.The harnesses would be housed in a huge
tank and would come down a series of troughs and there they would crawl onto
the kids who were strapped to gurneys.The skitter army was reduced to two and the Tom’s group story and
Maggie’s group story was still intact.

But, a day before shooting we were still a hundred thousand
dollars over-budget and we were still at a 9 day schedule.It frequently happens that we get into
crunch time like this on episodes and have to make big cuts and compromises at
the eleventh hour.In this case, I
remember, it was the day before Thanksgiving and everyone was under the
additional pressure of trying to get home to see their families.There was some heated debate about
whether we just eat the costs and be over budget - knowing we’d have to make up the
difference on a future episode or whether we’d find a way to make a cut.

Remi made the final broad-stroke decision – we’d cut a day out of the episode's shooting schedule, come hell or high water and get this one on budget.To do that we decided to cut the bulk of Tom and Maggie’s
story of moving through the factory and just concentrate on what happened
inside the harness room.The army
of skitters was now reduced to one. Line Producer, Grace Gilroy and I also came up with the idea that we would mount a
small splinter unit with a minimum crew outside the factory and that I would
direct key shots and small scenes of Tom and gang approaching the factory, and
Maggie rescuing the kids – so that Miguel and the main unit could concentrate
on the elaborate harness factory sequence.By doing this we effectively were able to shoot an
additional half-a-day's work but with minimal expense.

Again, I have to commend Miguel.These types of last minute budget crunch decisions get very
intense.Decisions and ideas fly
fast and furious with big changes that affect not only the story but also the
what and how of shooting rippling through everything.Miguel kept up with all of this and drove many
decisions. Again, in my experience, many
episodic directors can get lost in moments like these.They’ve been planning something in
their head and they are reluctant to change.He handled all of the pressure and changes well and
contributed many great solutions.

These moments are never fun – but frequently, when the
episode is all said and done no one would ever suspect compromises have been
made.I think this is the case
with this one.It looks great and
plays eerily.I think all of the key
tension and story points are there.

Very good episode!! I like how you show how Ben is still affected by the harness, but are you also going to show how deharnessing him early is going to affect him as well? Did the fact that he was deharness going to have any lasting effects on him as well, As I think there would be a difference from those that stayed fully harness throughout the process.

I do watch the show, but there seems to be something in every episode that seems so unreal that it breaks the magic. I'll give you a few examples. Episod where a plane lands at the airport. The pilot clams to be flying all the way to GreenLand in a single prop by wing plane. Where is the pilot gonna get the fuel. We spend much of the show with the group looking for fuel and this pilot has no problem with fuel? And it would need to be avation fuel as well. And to plant a spy you kill everyone but the spy? And who did this? The good skidders that want to revolt or the controled skidders that have no choice. If you could tighten up some of these gaps would make the show much better.

Hey Greg- My name is Derrial and I am a host on AfterBuzz TV (Afterbuzztv.com) I co-host a weekly Falling Skies recap every Sunday. We just had Sarah Carter and Brandon Jay on our show and would love to get you on as well. Whats the best way to contact you. My email is dchriston@mediaplace.us

Looks like the alien occupation has turned out to be a war of attrition. If so, humanity may have already lost. That is, unless there is a BIG game-changer that's going to happen.Until then, some observations:

Weapons handling/discipline looks much improved since Season 1, when you could count the muzzle sweeps each episode.

Next, you should tighten up security protocols: black out windows at night; noise reduction (motorcycles); everyone trained to fight to the best of their ability; cross-trained skills and redundant responsibilities. Hard to maintain when the outlook is bleak and morale is low.

Because of the Overlord's overall advantage in being able to retaliate, instead of training and deploying sniper units against them, it might be more advantageous to train kidnap squads and hold Overlords hostage as bargaining/trading chips. The more kids you can get back and de-harnessed, the harder they have to work at their goal of ultimately harnessing all the remaining children.

Once the above eventuality of ultimate defeat sinks in, resistance will turn into apathy, unless there is something or someone to give the survivors hope. You cannot maintain a resistance, a will to win, that is constantly running on the ragged edge of empty dispair.

y the negative attitude towards Anne, Tom and their baby. For one, I feel this is their ultimate revenge against the aliens, to continue the human race. 2, It adds a new dynamic to the show. 3, These people know that life is short and they have t

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